me: Music videos are getting more and more sexual. 20 years ago they would have been considered softcore pornography. The objectification and hypersexualization of women are harmful. Dozens of studies show the negative consequences they have on young girlsâ mental health. For example, girls as young as 5 and 6 years old are developing eating disorders, and one in four girls have depression before they hit 14âŚ
liberal: Ok but these artists choose to make these videos? Maybe stop shaming them? uwu
me: You have a weird definition of choice. You can only make a choice if you have valid alternatives. Women in the entertainment industry do not. Only 3% of creative directors are female. This means that 3% of the decision-making in media comes from women. That means 97% of how women are portrayed is decided on by men. How long do you think female artists would last in Hollywood if they refused to comply with menâs demands? How long would any woman last if she gained weight, stopped shaving, stopped wearing makeup, stop styling her hair, stopped doing her nails, stopped wearing revealing outfits and stopped catering to the male gaze? How long? She would be thrown away like trash within a week, and then immediately replaced by a younger, hippier woman willing to show even more skin. This is not an exercise of free choice but an accommodation to oppression. Refusing to comply would be socially and economically suicidal.
liberal: OMG stop victimizing women and stop denying their agency! They are expressing their sexuality and that should be celebrated!
me: It is not their sexuality they are expressing, but menâs. The women photographed are not actually responding sexually to anything. Theyâre not showing any desires of their own, they are objects of desire. Menâs desire. Men are the ones who will watch those videos, masturbate to them and get an orgasm, not women. These videos teach us nothing about female desire. They teach both men and women to eroticize only the womanâs body and the manâs desire. This is not good. It leads to women being exaggeratedly sensitive to male desire for their own arousal, and to men being exaggeratedly insensitive to female desire for theirs. This renders women more insecure about their sexuality, not more confident. It renders them vulnerable. Surveys show that young girls are already under enormous pressure to have anal sex and send their boyfriends nudes, even when theyâre scared and donât want to!
liberal: Jesus Christ, stop being such a prude! have you ever considered that some girls actually like sending nudes? not everyone feels pressured! Feminism is about choice, which means you have to respect all womenâs choices!! #stopslutshaming2018
me: Ok⌠I donât think you understand the scale of the problem. One in ten teenage girls has an eating disorder, 20 percent of college women binge and purge on a regular basis. 5 to 15 percent of hospitalized anorexics die in treatment, and forty to fifty percent of them never recover completely. Thirty-one percent of nine-year-olds think they are too fat, and 81 percent ten-year-olds want to go on a diet. On any day, 25 percent of women are on diets, with 50 percent finishing, breaking or starting one. In a recent study of high school girls, 53 percent were unhappy with their bodies by age thirteen, by age eighteen and over, 78 percent were dissatisfied. One in four young girls is depressed before they turn 14. The suicide rate among women between the ages of 20 and 24 is at its highest point on record, with a rise of 76 percent since 2006. More than 20% of young men and women are having anal sex, despite both men and women believing it likely to hurt the woman. Thatâs one in five straight couples! Researchers have also found examples of non-consensual penetration either with a finger or penis in a âtry it and seeâ approach, with the boy hoping the girl would not stop him. âSome events, particularly the âaccidentalâ penetration reported by some interviewees, were ambiguous in terms of whether or not they would be classed as rape, but we know from one interview that âaccidentsâ may happen on purpose, after a respondent admitted telling his girlfriend that he had accidentally penetrated her anally, when in fact he had done it on purpose.âÂ
In light of all of this, I have to ask: So what if celebrities - who are the most privileged of the privileged - want to make sexual music videos? What if they âchooseâ it? What if they âlikeâ it? Their choices still harm millions of women all over the world. Why are you defending celebritiesâ right to pose half-naked instead of defending 5-year oldsâ right not to starve themselves to death? why are you not defending teenage girlsâ right not be anally raped by their boyfriends? Where are your fucking priorities?!!!
liberal: Girl, byeeee. Block and stay safe everyone <3 <3
